A Canadian family follows their calling to Brazil to serve as full time missionaries with the Xingu Mission.

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Thursday, June 4, 2015

I Want To Go Home

Standing in our hallway, my daughter looked up at me with
her big, brown, tear filled eyes and asked me, ‘Mommy, where is home?’

I paused, took a deep breath and told her that home is
wherever we are, that our family is home.Four walls don’t make a home, a country doesn’t make a home, a family
does.

“But Mommy,” she protested, “Canada feels like home, but now
we are here and we are here for two years and then we only go back for a few
months and come back here again.So,
it’s like Brazil is home but it’s not, because I don’t feel normal here," a tear left a wet trail down her cheek.

I fought my own tears.It’s a battle I have in my own heart almost daily.I have a heart in two places.As a child, a missionary kid, she’s
considered ‘third culture’ a mixture of where she’s from and where she is she
isn’t strongly part of either one.It’s
a tough place to be in some days.

Yesterday was one of those tough ones.

Faith lay with her head on my lap, tears fell from her eyes
and I wiped away each one.She cried for
the friends she left behind, for the family she longs to see at holidays, she
cried for the way kids make fun of her when she speaks English, she cried for
the middle ground she lives in.

I held her and whispered in her ear that some days, Mommy
feels exactly the same way.

‘I just want to go home, I just want to feel normal’ she
said through tears and a trembling bottom lip.

What I couldn’t bear to whisper in her ear is that the
reality is, there is no going home.

Even
when we land in Canada a year from now, home will no longer feel the way it
did.The comfort of ordered streets that
are well paved, clear of litter and stray dogs will be replaced with a feeling
of estrangement.It will feel oddly
sterile. Friends have made new friends. The landscape has changed.

The puzzle you once fit into
with ease, is still there but you, the piece of it that flew away to a far
away land, you are no longer the same shape.Try as you might, your shape no longer fits the same way into the void
you left behind.

No, I couldn’t tell her that part.She’ll learn that on her own.

Many times, often daily, I have to remind myself that God
called not just Phil and I into this adventure, he called our kids too.They aren’t skin tags, along for the ride.
They are part of this thing.There is
purpose in it for them too.

This week our base leaders took there two youngest daughters
to the airport to see them off, back to Canada where one will stay to go to
University and the other visit with her sisters before returning to Brazil for
her last year of high school.Another missionary family recently took their oldest son back to the U.S. for the same reason.My heart aches for the mothers who now live
with thousands of miles between them and the children who have been beside them,
working with them, doing life as a family in a way that most don’t get to
experience.They have been together for
every victory and every tear.

But all
that closeness, it comes with a high price tag.One day, if we are still doing this missionary life, we may have to do
the same.

My own words ring in my head, ‘home is our family’.

But what happens when
your family is now in two places?It’s
normal for your kids to grow up and find a life of their own, but normally they
move maybe a couple hours away, not a continent.

The gifts in this life, they are enormous.The sacrifices are too.

The daughters of our base leader wrote a children's story for their Mom. About a Momma bird and her four babies and how the Momma bird feels like her heart is flying away with her babies as they leave the nest. In the end, the Momma bird learns that she can learn to sing a

gain, she finds her song.

One of the biggest challenges as parents is letting our kids fly, letting them go and figure out this life. Even if they are still doing it with us. When Faith's heart is breaking for home, I want to fix that hurt, I want to get on a plane and take us back. But that would be robbing her of the richness God has planned for her, that the pain and the struggle are some of the best nuggets in life.

Not only so, but we[a] also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance;4 perseverance, character; and character, hope.5 And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us. Romans 5:35

I know in my heart of hearts that the things she is learning here, the character that is being built in her at such a young age will prepare her to fly higher than I ever have or will in my life. And isn't that what we want as parents? For our kids to fly higher, live larger?

3 comments:

Sue Hussey
said...

My heart hurts for Faith... though knowing God does have a purpose for all of this makes it ease. She is so young and though the calling is big, her knowledge hasnt caught up yet. She is a brave warrior and will face the race as it faces her. I pray a blessing over her and the love of God to comfort her, and healing presence to calm her and a peace that reassures her. She will always be loved, charished and WANTED back here... but we do set her free to do the will of God even when it seems hard. There is an annointing and with that comes a huge responsiblity on her little life to be greater than she ever thought she would or could be. It is amazing to watch her bloom and grow!HUGS Faith... always know we love you!!!

We love you guys and miss you. You are always part of our family and never far from our thoughts and prayers. We will be praying for Faith as she grows as a "missionary kid". They are big shoes she has to grow into.All we here in Canada can is "we love you". Cliches don't cut it. But I can say we will pray for you guys and do it.Love D

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Get to know the Snells

My husband and I met in 1999, in Calabar, Nigeria-West Africa, while volunteering for a primate conservation project called CERCOPAN (www.cercopan.org). All those years ago we had no idea the journey that lay ahead. After becoming engaged and returning to Canada we came to know a God who loved us and who had a plan for our lives. This blog chronicles the ups and downs of an adventure with God in the Northern Brazilian city of Maraba, as we attempt to bring the good news to this region.